3rd Parties: Throwing Your Vote Away?

[unmerged(30848)]

I've been playing a VIP 0.2 GC as US, and it's now 1915. Liberals are definitely in the majority, and the Union Party (my preferred of the options left to me) constantly leads the polls at about 35%. Yet several times in a row, the conservative Democratic Party has won the election with 25% in the polls. In the 1910(ish) election campaign, I made sure to promote the issues espoused by the Union Party, and they still lost.

Does anyone know why the election keeps getting Shanghai'd by those Democratic cheaters? What can Ido to get my Union Party boys into office? I've seen other countries elect ahistorical parties (I've even elected the Whigs before), so I don't think that the possible winners are hard-coded to the big two. Hurry, I only have one election left before the end of the game

 

[Darkrenown]

In a two party state the big 2 parties get a bonus during elections.

 

[Raph]

I've been playing a VIP 0.2 GC as US, and it's now 1915. Liberals are definitely in the majority, and the Union Party (my preferred of the options left to me) constantly leads the polls at about 35%. Yet several times in a row, the conservative Democratic Party has won the election with 25% in the polls. In the 1910(ish) election campaign, I made sure to promote the issues espoused by the Union Party, and they still lost.

Does anyone know why the election keeps getting Shanghai'd by those Democratic cheaters? What can Ido to get my Union Party boys into office? I've seen other countries elect ahistorical parties (I've even elected the Whigs before), so I don't think that the possible winners are hard-coded to the big two. Hurry, I only have one election left before the end of the game

You could edit away third-party status.

 

[swilhelm73]

Well there are two primary things you can do.

Get your people to be of the same ideology as the party you want.

Get your people's issues to match the party's.

To do the former raise clergy, promote or demote POPs, etc.

For the latter all you can do is use those election period events.

 

[unmerged(29803)]

When you say "polls", do you mean the opinion polls in the politics tab or popularity (shown in the party list tab)?

The former is based solely on ideology of your pops and current voting rights. I.e. with univ. suffrage this pie chart will be identical at all times to the ideology chart in the demographics tab.
Election results however are based on both ideology and dominant/secondary issues (I'm still unsure how these factors are weighed but they definitely both play a part) Therefore, check party popularity - this is the percentage next to each party in the party list tab - as it tends to be a better indicator, although still not entirely accurate. Also, keep an eye on dominant & secondary issues in the demographics tab; possibly the current issues are weighing against the union party...

 

[unmerged(30848)]

Well, I should have one election left. I'll see if I can do any more to promote my party. I thought that last election was in the bag.